250 
AMEEIOAI'^ AGEIOULTUEIST. 
Farming in England, 
ALFRED TBUMBLE. 
During a recent tour of Europe, the writer spent 
most of his time among the farmers of the coun¬ 
tries he visited. He was familiar with eountry life 
at home, and everywhere contrasted the condition 
of the foreign farmer with that of the agriculturist 
in the United States. It is for the purpose of il- 
ASr AGRICULTURAL LABORER. 
lustrating these eontrasts, that he presents this 
sketch and its accompanying pictures to the public. 
Everything about farm-life in England is strange 
to American eyes. The great waste of land and 
labor in hedging and ditching is striking to one ac¬ 
customed to our own more economical and ready 
system of fencing. All year round, the care of 
hedges and ditches on a farm of any size, keeps 
THE PLOW-BOX. 
several men employed, and the farms themselves 
seem strangely cramped to one accustomed to the 
broad, open stretclies of the West. The people in 
their odd dress, work more slowly than do the 
[June, 
laborers in our own fields; the horses are larger, 
heavier, and more deliberate in their movements, 
and the implements of farming are often unwieldy 
and ridiculously primitive in form. Almost the 
only feature of the country in England that strikes 
an American as enviable, is the magnificent roads, 
which even in the worst of weather, are fairly good 
for travel. Tlie spirit of improvement is now 
spurring the English farmers into an approach to 
the enterprise of our own land. Agricultural 
schools are doing good work, and modern machin¬ 
ery is being extensively introduced. In Suffolk, 
Norfolk, Lincoln, and some other counties, agri¬ 
culture has attained to a high degree of perfec¬ 
tion, but in others it is in a primitive state. 
Land in England is more fi'equeutly leased than 
owned by the farmer. Many leaseholds have been 
in one family for generations, and their holders 
could buy the land as far as money was concerned, 
but the great land-owners will not sell it, and the 
farmer remains a tenant. He may pick up odd 
spots of ground here and there, and often will be 
found farming lands of his 
own ten miles apart, and 
residing and cultivating a 
large estate, for which he 
pays rent as well. Wheat, 
barley, and stock-farming, 
are the great agricultural 
interests of England. In 
the western counties,where 
the climate is more suitable 
for grass and less so for 
wheat, dairy farming and 
stock - raising rule. The 
eastern counties furnish 
the wheat-land, but all over 
England are found perma¬ 
nent pastures, where count¬ 
less herds fatten. Yet the 
supply of meat is still so in¬ 
sufficient, that large imports 
from America are necessary. 
America is, indeed, the 
great bugbear of the Eng¬ 
lish farmer. As a recent 
statistician truly observes: 
American competition has 
reduced his profits on grain¬ 
growing and beef-raising 
more than fifty per cent. 
He pays a higher rent than 
we do, and uses more ex- 
jiensive machinery. More¬ 
over, the high rent forces 
him to demand high rates 
for his productions. American wheat and American 
beef can be landed at Liverpool at from a quarter 
to a third less the bushel and pound than the Eng¬ 
lish can be sold for, and still pay our own farmers 
a better profit. The English farmers are like their 
tools—built to last, but not to work fast. They 
take things easy, and are little interested in affairs 
off their farms. They do not read many papers, 
and almost their only relaxation is found at an an¬ 
nual fair or two, and at election time. Of late 
years, the sporting farmer has formed an exception 
to the rule. He imitates the follies and extrava¬ 
gances of the great folks, goes hunting, plays bil¬ 
liards, bets on the races, and drinks his way down 
the road to ruin, rapidly and easiljq but he is an 
exception fortunately, and will remain one. 
The English farmer is a good feeder. He be¬ 
lieves in treating himself and his household well. 
His house is commonly as solid and old-fashioned 
as his tools. One Welsh farm-house, of which we 
present a picture, is more than four hundred years 
old. Its tenant is a very wealthy man, but he can¬ 
not buy it, though he desires to do so and rebuild. 
Here and there are found old manors, deserted to 
the winds sometimes, at others still inhabited. 
They are absolutely sepulchral in their gloom, and 
justify the ghost stories with which they are one 
and all associated. The mansions of the great 
land-owners, ancient and modern, are, on the con¬ 
trary, marvels of luxury. In them science has 
remedied the imperfections of the past. The pro¬ 
prietors of some of these estates farm them them¬ 
selves, on a vast scale, frequently with American 
methods and machinery. 
Society in rural England is divided into as rigid 
departments as it is in the cities. The squire steps 
aside to let my-lord pass, and the tenant-farmer 
takes off his hat to the squire. As for the agricul ■ 
tuial laborer, he doffs his bat to every one, from 
the gTeat man of the district down to the “squire’s 
man,” whose business it is to keep his master post¬ 
ed on all the small goings-on of the community he 
lords it over. The English agricultural laborer is 
a singular individual. Except that he has a per¬ 
manent home, he is no better than the tramp hands 
who are employed upon our great western farms, 
when the season comes round. He is absolutely 
uneducated, and he knows little more of the soil 
he helps to cultivate, than the horses which drag 
the plow or the crows which follow the sower. He 
begins life as a crow-boy, sitting on a fence and 
shouting all day long, to keep the crows from 
plundering the furrows; he ends life a man of 
full size, but only a child in intelligence stUl. 
The condition of the English agricultural laborer 
varies with that of the district to which he belongs. 
On poor lands, he earns at the best eight shillings 
(about two dollars) a week, on good ones he rises 
to fifteen and even twenty. In some districts, iVfe 
find him living rent free, in others he has to pay 
rent. But whether he pays the rent in money or 
not, the landlord gets its price from him, and to 
keep body and soul together, he must work con¬ 
stantly and put all of his family at tasks. His 
sons begin to do some kind of service almost as 
soon as they can walk. Then they are promoted 
to the plow, or otherwise to assist about the farm. 
If such a boy can get a job in the barns or stables, 
his highest ambition is achieved. 
The misery of the bulk of agricultural laborers 
in over-crowded England is indescribable. Num¬ 
bers have of recent years been sent to Canada and 
Australia by popular subscription, but the mass 
which remains is in no better condition than be¬ 
fore. Not a little of this is due to himself. Many 
landlords do their best to improve the condition of 
their laborers, but those who should benefit by 
their efforts, are so steeped in ignorance and so un¬ 
manned by hardship, that they are incapable of 
assisting their benefactors in their good work. 
An English writer not long ago said : “ Though 
slavery has been unknown in England for cen¬ 
turies, we have, in the agricultural laborer, a crea¬ 
ture who is a slave in everything but name. He is 
a vassal of the soil. He belongs to the same estate 
his great grandfather did, just as a Russian serf be- 
